


Underneath the Sycamore

by plethodon_cinereus



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe- No Supernatural, Episode: s13e10 Wayward Sisters, F/F, Female Solidarity, Fluff, High School, Meet-Cute, No Season 15 Spoilers, No Spoilers, Pining, Pre-Season/Series 15, Slow Burn, Useless Lesbians, misogynistic farm boys, wlw
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-16
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:08:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23682136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plethodon_cinereus/pseuds/plethodon_cinereus
Summary: Claire is finishing her last year of high school at a new school and plans on keeping her head down and getting through it, not wanting to get attached to anything. The universe has other plans and she finds herself intrigued by the girl next to her in class.Title is from the Death Cab for Cutie song
Relationships: Kaia Nieves/Claire Novak
Kudos: 4





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't seen any of season 15 so this is pretty much entirely based on what we saw between Claire and Kaia in Wayward Sisters.

Claire’s eyes scanned the faces of twenty-some strangers seated in the jagged rows of bench tables of the classroom. The room smelled like a combination of her garage and a construction site: fresh wood and pine-sol mingling with dirt and must. Already she felt out of place standing for a beat too long at the door. Twenty unfamiliar faces pretended not to stare at the blonde girl lingering on the edge of the classroom.  
It’s bad enough that Jody insisted she finish out her last year of high school; going to a new public school smack in the middle of buttfuck nowhere really didn’t help things. She’d made Alex sign her up for classes. Claire was here to do the bare minimum to graduate then get out of dodge. Not like she had a real plan. She’ll burn that bridge when she gets to it.  
She procrastinated picking a seat by pretending to retie her shoes. Plant-biology-whatever was promised to be the easiest science credit, though the caveat was it being in the ag department with all the FFA nerds. Claire counted thirteen camo hats and ten pairs of cowboy boots. Thank fucking god there was at least one other girl here. She feigned confidence and dropped into the seat beside her.   
Something about this girl caught Claire’s eye right away. She seemed…like her. Like there was something on her mind, something inside her that set her apart from the other teenagers. It was intriguing. Though, if she were being completely honest with herself, a good portion of her decision to sit next to this girl was pure attraction. She had brown hair so dark it was almost black cascading in waves just past her shoulders. It’s pretty damn hard to make a hoodie and black jeans look cool, but she pulled it off.   
The girl looked up and whispered “hey” so quietly she may as well not have spoken at all. Claire caught a glimpse of soft pink lips and the barest trace of liner around her eyes before she looked back down, fidgeting with her bracelets.   
What’s a girl like her doing in a class like this? Claire wondered. A gorgeous girl with hints of an artsy-punk persona didn’t belong anywhere near the gang of pervy farm boys seated behind them. She sulked back in her seat and pretended to be doing something on her phone. A girl that cool and pretty would never be interested in Claire so it wasn’t worth even thinking about. Besides, it’s not like she’s gonna be around here much longer.  
Halfway through the class there was a pause as the teacher, a rotund bearded man at least a decade past retirement age, switched from going over the syllabus to a slideshow. Claire sighed and took her phone out as if the two minute pause was long enough to do much of anything on it.   
Unexpectedly, the girl in the hoodie turned to face her. “I’m Kaia, by the way,” she said. Her voice was low and rhythmic, balancing between friendly and nervous like the meow of a wary stray cat.   
“Oh, cool. I’m Claire.”   
There wasn’t time for conversation beyond that; the farm boys next to them started loudly discussing the annoying girl who had graduated last year after dating each and every one of them. From the sounds of it they were petty assholes at best or purely misogynistic at worst. At least Claire won’t be alone with them all year.


	2. Chapter 2

The black jeans were a terrible decision in hindsight. Kaia should have known better, after all she did sign up for a plant biology class. Of course they’d be having class outside on nice days. Still, that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to complain about the heat.   
Fifteen minutes into class she relented and took off her hoodie. She preferred to wear long sleeves to cover up the various scars on her arms (most caused by petty fights or her own sheer clumsiness) but really didn’t care all that much what people in this class thought. Well, except for that girl. Claire.   
Kaia had to admit that about the last place she expected Claire to sit on the first day of class was right next to her. She didn’t think anyone would even talk to her in this class. She’d settled right into her stereotype as the quiet, unexceptional loner kid way back in freshman year. Kaia pretends her social isolation was her choice instead of being forced upon her after one too many public anxiety attacks. But the girl next to her was new, so she wouldn’t know about any of that. In this case, anonymity was a blessing.   
“I thought these would be prickly,” Claire’s soft voice interrupted her self-pity session. She was holding a seed pod from the tree they were sitting under while the teacher prattled on about leaf venation. She hadn’t made the same mistake Kaia did and was wearing denim shorts with a t-shirt paying homage to some band she had never heard of. Her blonde hair waved slightly in the humidity. Kaia ran a hand through hers self-consciously; all it does in warm weather is get frizzier.  
“They’re not?” she replied.  
“Nah, it just falls apart,” Claire pinched the seed pod and sure enough it popped apart into a cascade of hundreds of feathery seeds. They caught the sunlight in the same way as Claire’s black painted nails.  
“Nice,” Kaia picked up another one and broke it in half.   
“So, how’d you end up in this class?” Claire said. “You sure as hell don’t seem like a farm kid.” She uncrossed her legs and leaned back on her hands.  
Kaia shrugged, “I’m not. My foster mom’s friends with the teacher. What about you?”   
“I heard it was the easiest bio credit. And it’s kind of nice getting out of a fucking classroom for a change.”   
The boy sitting next to them, an unbelievably lanky kid named Garth, said Kaia’s name to get her attention. When she looked up the teacher had stopped talking entirely was glaring at her and Claire. Kaia’s face flushed and she avoided eye contact, letting her hair fall to cover her face. Satisfied with her apparent remorse, he continued.   
Of course the moment had to be ruined. Kaia had finally gathered the courage to talk to the girl, and the teacher had to go and glare at them for talking in class. Like they were the only ones doing it.   
Re-entering the dark, oppressive school building was jarring after spending the morning in the sun. Kaia had snuck a peek at Claire’s class schedule taped to the front of her notebook and noticed that she had the same teacher for Literature, just at a different time. Good to know.  
“Hey, so, what lunch period do you have? I spent last week sitting with these stoner kids in my math class but they’re…not the greatest. Maybe we could sit together?” The hesitation, nervousness, was obvious in Claire’s voice. Kaia felt the urge to slap her upside the head. Claire was the cool one, the pretty one, she had no reason whatsoever to be nervous around a nobody like herself.  
“Oh, yeah, um, second block. I could meet you outside the library?”  
“Great! See you then!”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abandoning work

Sorry to anyone who actually wanted to read this oops  
Life is nuts rn and I don’t really have time to write, so this is abandoned  
Unless people start commenting saying they’re interested (tbh I’m a sucker for validation and even like two comments would do the trick) I’m abandoning it until further notice  
But yeah dreamhunter for life let’s go lesbians

**Author's Note:**

> Come bother me on tumblr @plethodon_cinereus


End file.
